Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Scattered Thoughts

I went to the LYS today and looked around for a bit, rather guiltily. But I escaped, my only new item being the knowledge that I can sit and knit with the staff if ever I am lonely... and that they know my name now. (Is this good or bad, that the yarn store staff know my name?)

I have this real desire for more sock yarn, and it's getting to be a bit obnoxious. I MUST finish these that I have first. So, I went home and forced myself to knit on the pink broadripples. The PAIR will be finished by Wednesday so I can give them away. I don't know why I'm having so much trouble finishing these!

Babies are being conceived everywhere, it appears. I am excited about the prospect of knitting things for them, though. I hope every baby I know about is a girl, so that I can knit pink ruffles.

Speaking of pink ruffles, I shall soon be a bridesmaid in my sister's wedding. This, amazingly, infringes even on my life, some six hours away. How odd that we Christians have picked this one ceremony (sacrament?) to be so special. I want a Kitchenaid mixer for my baptism. What about the Eucharist? Doesn't THAT deserve a $600 cake?

I've been having this odd craving lately to go do a rosary. I'm not Roman Catholic, and although my mother is high church Episcopalian I have been an ardent United Methodist these last few years. I'm not sure what I should make of this craving, since it also coincides with the desire to learn to spin. Maybe my hands just don't have enough to do? I must learn to knit while I am washing dishes or taking a shower or reading.

I found this today. It's colored cotton. Naturally. And also sustainably. I REALLY want to learn how to spin cotton. It seems silly to have grown up all of my life with fields behind my house filled with the stuff and not know how to change it from a little poof in a shell to the thing that is one of my greatest passions--yarn. I can remember picking up the balls out of the field when I was a kid. I remember watching someone show us how to card and spin at school, and I came home, picked out the seeds, and twisted a little section into yarn. Even then I thought it was cool to see the process that changes a tiny seed into something wearable. I must find a spinner here!

Along those same lines, I am beginning to feel a deeper connection to place, to here in the South. This is also quite odd, since I've spent many years trying to figure out how to leave Texas. But as I was driving back yesterday I was admiring the openness, the sky. I saw an old woman walking back to her house and I realized that I do, indeed, love it here. This place is my place. There is room to just be here. The moon hung in the sky tonight so big, and even from my yard in this little flat city I could see the stars. I understand things here, in this place. I understand how people think and why they think the way that they do. I understand why Georgia O'Keefe came here and found her art in the plain colors. There is room here to see for miles and drive out in the country where there is nothing but red dirt and yell loudly. There is also room to sit quietly. There are terrible things here like tornados and dust storms and mud rain and wind that will drive a person crazy. There's not always a lot of appreciation for differences. But there are redeeming qualities that my friends and I ignore far too often. There is a lot of love here. Even a girl with liberal tendencies, a tattoo, and a nose ring, can be accepted by a circle of older women. There is a connection between us all. We have lived here. We have survived the drought and the rains and the open spaces, and we even dared to thrive throughout it all. We have passed down the tools throughout the generations, and there are still people to share our love with. We young 'uns often forget about respect in our need to move forward and reject the past. I think that this is what knitting does for us. It connects us back and back to our mothers and grandmothers and farther and farther. Women have always been doing this. Women must always be doing this.

It is too easy, always, to dismiss someone, to dismiss a place, as ordinary. There really isn't anything ordinary. We shouldn't work so hard to be special. The most special people are the ones that recognize the negative and decide to be positive anyway. The most special people are the ones that look at the terrible awfulness of life and decide, anyway, to love.

Well, I've waxed eloquent enough for a while. I just keep hearing how terrible this town is, how "there's nothing to do," and "nothing but narrow-minded people" and "why in God's name would anyone live here." I also, let these words slip out of my mouth, and I wanted to say, for the record, that I understant the beauty, too. I understand the importance of open space and deep connection to the earth. So there. That's enough.